Biblion Bible Commentary
Read the introduction to Ephesians · About this commentary
Do Not Grieve the Spirit
Ephesians 4:29-32
29 Let no corrupt speech proceed out of your mouth, but only what is good for building others up as the need may be, that it may give grace to those who hear. · WEB
Speech is measured by whether it builds someone, and the sin the Spirit is said to grieve over is bitterness among believers.
Verse 29 sets the test for speech and it is not accuracy. Let no corrupt speech proceed out of your mouth — the adjective is used of rotten fruit — but only what is good for building others up as the need may be.
The standard is construction, and it is situational: as the need may be. Words that would build one person up may not build another, so the measure is the hearer rather than the speaker's intent. And the purpose clause is startling — that it may give grace to those who hear. Grace is what the letter has said God gives Ephesians 2:8; here ordinary conversation is asked to deliver it.
Then verse 30, placed between two verses about speech: do not grieve the Holy Spirit of God. The verb is the one for causing sorrow to a person, and the letter does not soften it into displeasing or offending.
What the placement says is that the grieving in view is the talk on either side of it. And the clause attached is a reassurance rather than a threat — in whom you were sealed for the day of redemption, the seal of chapter 1 Ephesians 1:13. The Spirit who can be grieved is the Spirit who is not leaving.
Verse 31 lists six things to be put away, and they escalate from feeling to speech to intent: bitterness, wrath, anger, outcry, slander, malice.
And verse 32 replaces them with three, then grounds all of it: forgiving each other, just as God also in Christ forgave you. The measure of forgiveness owed is the forgiveness received, which is the letter's method throughout — nothing is asked that has not first been given.
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